Modified cricket game

ABSTRACT

A modified cricket game is played by a group of players on a conventional cricket field. Each player (1) attempts to hit an equal number of balls bowled by other players and (2) bowls an equal number of balls. A batsman earns points for runs scored and loses points for outs made. A bowler earns points for recording outs and loses points for runs allowed. Players in the field earn points by catching a fly ball and getting or assisting a run out and lose points for dropping a fly ball, miss fielding and allowing a boundary, and bowling noballs and wide balls. The player who scores the highest point total as a bowler receives the “bowling title”. The player who scores the highest point total as a batsman receives the “batting title”. The player with the highest combined point total from bowling, batting, and fielding is the overall winner.

I. CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims the benefit, pursuant to 35 U.S.C. §119(e), ofapplicants' provisional U.S. patent application Ser. No. 60/696,748,filed Jul. 6, 2005, entitled “cricket game allowing group of players tocompete against each other while providing entertainment for theaudience and players,” which is incorporated in to this application bythis reference in its entirety, for all purposes.

This application describes a modified cricket game that allows a groupof players to compete individually against each other while providingentertainment for the audience and players. More particularly theapplication describes a modified cricket game that directly measures anindividual player's overall skills as well as batting and bowlingskills.

II. BACKGROUND

Currently, cricket players are ranked based upon statistics from pastgames. However, there is no method for players to compete against eachother to test their abilities or skills in the game and have a directway to measure their ranking based on skills.

A cricket player's skills are measured in three areas, bowling, batting,and fielding. A cricket game involves batsmen, bowlers, a wicket keeper,and fielders. A cricket player with combined skills of batting, bowlingand fielding is called an “All rounder”. The objective of the cricketgame is to hit a ball bowled by the bowler and score runs by runningbetween wickets or by hitting beyond a clearly marked line around thefield. This clearly marked line around the field is called the boundaryline. In the cricket game, a hit that flies over the boundary line andhas its first bounce outside the boundary line records six runs while ahit that rolls on the ground and passes the boundary line records fourruns. While the batting team players hit and collect runs, the fieldingteam bowlers and players try to get batsmen out, while trying to limitruns scored by the batting team. Once the first team finishes batting byeither completing a set number of overs of batting or by whole sidegetting out the second team players get their turn to bat. Intraditional cricket game a six balls bowled by a bowler is called anover. The team with the most runs at the end of the game wins.

Many other professional games such as baseball and basketball have ashort version of the game to measure and compare individual player'sskills. More importantly these short version games provide fast paceentertainment to the audience. For example, Baseball has a game known as“Home Run Derby”. This game allows baseball players to compete eachother on their skill of power hitting. Another example is a “Slam Dunk”contest in basketball. These games are very successful and attract manyfans. More importantly these short versions help to increase theinterest of the game among the general public. Examples of such gamescan be found in the prior arts. U.S. Pat. No. 5,211,394 to Jackson, etal. describes a baseball hitting game. U.S. Pat. No. 5,803,839 toPalmer, et al. describes a backyard base ball game. U.S. Pat. No.5,020,801 to Negron describes a baseball home run contest game.

III. SUMMARY

The modified cricket game involves many aspects of a conventionalcricket game, including many of the rules. Cricket fans have longadmired the all round performance of cricket players. The rules of themodified cricket game reward an individual player's ability to scoreruns, to bowl without giving runs, to get batsmen out, and to field. Themodified cricket game pits individual players against each other ratherthan one team against another. Further, the pace of the action in themodified cricket game is considerably faster, which provides excitingentertainment to the audience as well as players.

IV. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The modified cricket game may include a number of features that differfrom traditional cricket, including:

-   -   only one batsman is batting and running between wickets any time        during the game;    -   only one bowling wicket and one bawling wicket are present        throughout the game;    -   every player wears a number which can be read from the stand;    -   all players stay in the field and play the game from start to        end of the game;    -   optionally, the fielders keep rotating in the field positions        while one player is batting;    -   some fielders keep exchanging in their field positions every        time there is a change in the batsman or the bowler;    -   each player gets to play every field position in the field for        equal number of balls bowled by a bowler;    -   a batsman scores points by hitting boundaries and running        between wickets for in-field hits;    -   a bowler scores points by getting, batsmen out,    -   a fielder scores points by catching a fly ball and recording an        out for the batsman as well as for the bowler;    -   a batsman scores negative points by getting out;    -   a bowler scores negative points by batsmen scoring runs;    -   a bowler scores negative points by violating standard bowling        rules and bowl wide or noballs;    -   a fielder scores negative points by dropping a fly ball;    -   a fielder scores negative points by miss-fielding and allowing a        boundary;    -   a group of players play the game while maintaining individual        scores;    -   a player who plays as the batsman hits the balls bowled by the        other players playing the game;    -   every player gets to hit the same number of balls;    -   every player gets to bowl the same number of balls;    -   the player who scores the most points from batting skills wins        the batting title;    -   the player who allows the least points from bowling skills wins        the bowling title;    -   the player who scores the most overall points by his/her        bowling, batting and fielding skills at the end of the game will        be the overall winner;    -   optionally, the game can be played with a non-competing player        in the wicket keeper position throughout the game;    -   the use of a special score sheet to enter scores;    -   the score sheet can be programmed into a Microsoft Excel        worksheet which enables to select winners and the rankings        without any delay at the end of the game;    -   the game can be played within a few hours time;    -   the length of the game can be controlled by the number of balls        bowled by an individual player;    -   the individual players have independent sponsors;    -   enabling individual players to showcase their cricket skills in        bowling, batting, and fielding;    -   increasing the commercial interest in cricket without scarifying        the integrity of cricket; and    -   helping to develop “All round” cricketers in the cricket game.

The features above among others are described in connection with thefigures included in the application. FIG. 1 illustrates a cricket field12 for the invented game 10 which consists of a boundary line 14, apitch 15, a bowling wicket 16, and a batting wicket 18. FIG. 2illustrates a cricket field 12 for the invented game 10 marked withvarious field positions A 20 through L 31 in the field. Batsman positionA 20 is located in front of the batting wicket 18. Bowler position B 21is located behind the bowling wicket 16. Wicket Keeper position C 22 islocated behind the batting wicket 18. There are another nine fieldpositions D 23 through L 31 located in the cricket field 12. All thesefield positions A 20 through L 31 are located inside the boundary line14. There are all together twelve field positions A 20 through L 31 inthe current invention. Out of these twelve positions only three fieldpositions are in fixed locations. They are batsman position A 20, bowlerposition B 21 and wicket keeper position C 22.

FIG. 3 illustrates a cricket field 12 for the invented game 10 wheretwelve players (P1) 32 through (P12) 43 have taken their positions tostart the game. Player one (P1) 32 has taken the batsman position A 20.Player two (P2) 33 has taken the bowler position B 21. Player three (P3)34 has taken the wicket keeper position C 22. Player four (P4) 35through player twelve (P12) 43 have taken rest of the nine fieldpositions D 23 through L 31.

FIG. 3 through FIG. 13 illustrate how players move in the invented game10 in the cricket field 12 during the batting turn of the player one(P1) 32. FIG. 4 through FIG. 13 further show that when player one (P1)32 plays the position of the batsman A 20 player two (P2) 33 throughplayer twelve (P12) 43 gets a turn to play the bowler position B 21.Player one's (P1) 32 turn to play the batsman position A 20 ends oncethe player twelve (P12) 43 finishes his/her position as the bowler B 21bowling to player one (P1) 32. An alternative embodiment of the game 10is to keep the player at wicket keeper position C 22 position unchangedduring the game 10. In this embodiment of the game 10 the player at thewicket keeper position C 22 does not compete with other players.

An alternative embodiment of the game 10 is to let player at the bowlerposition B 21 keep bowling to other players one at a time who moves tothe batsman position A 20 and face a set number of balls bowled by theplayer at the bowler position B 21. Once the player at the bowlerposition B 21 finish bowling to all other players another player move tothe bowler position B 21.

FIG. 14 illustrates player two (P2) 33 at the batsman position A 20 forthe first time. FIG. 13 through FIG. 24 illustrates how players move inthe cricket field 12 during the batting turn of the player two (P2) 33.FIG. 25 shows player three (P3) 34 in action at the batsman position A20 for the first time facing player one (P1) 32 at the bowler position B21. It also shows how other players move in the field to get playerthree (P3) 34 to the batsman position 20.

FIG. 3 shows player four (P4) 35 playing at the position D 23. FIG. 6shows player four (P4) 35 playing at the position E 24. FIG. 17 showsplayer four (P4) 35 playing at the position F 25. FIG. 28 shows playerfour (P4) 35 playing at the position G 26. During the invented game 10player four (P4) 35 keeps moving to different field positions and at theend of the game player four (P4) complete playing at all the fieldpositions A 20 through L 31. At the same time all other players also getto play all field positions.

The game 10 continues following the pattern illustrated in FIG. 3through FIG. 24 with each player moving to the batsman position A 20.When player twelve (P12) 43 complete playing the batsman position A 20the invented game 10 ends.

FIG. 29 shows the score sheet 50 for the game 10. This score sheet 50can be programmed into an Excel worksheet score card 52 (FIG. 30A andFIG. 30B) which can be also used during the game 10 to enter scores. Useof Excel worksheet score card 52 makes it easier to select the winnersat the end of the game 10. Since Excel worksheet is programmed to do thecomputations required to find the winners, it takes only a short timeafter the game to find the winners. If score sheet 50 is used to recordthe scores it takes little longer time to do the computations andidentify the winners. All computations are done according to the gamerules summarized in the table below. The game 10 is played according tothe traditional cricket game rules with exception of the game rulesshown in the table below. FIG. 31 shows a sample completed score card56. In that sample completed score card 56 game winner was the playernumber 4 with a score of 7, the batting title was won by the playernumber 9 with a score of 16, and the bowling title was won by the playernumber 12 with a score of 2. Rules for the Cricket Derby ™(CricDerby ™) 1. Up to twelve players in the field including batsman andbowler. 2. Each player gets equal number of balls to hit. These ballsare bowled by the other players (all players in the field bowl equalnumber of balls to the player who is batting). 3. Each clean bowled outgives two points to the bowler and two negative points to the batsman.4. Each fly ball out gives one point to the player who caught the balland two points to the bowler. 5. A drop catch give one negative point tothe fielder who drop the catch. 6. If a miss fielding allows a boundary,one negative point records to the fielder. 7. Each run out gets onepoints to the fielder who records it. In case of an assisted run out,both fielders get one point. 8. Game is played under regular cricketrules accept the rules stated here. 9. A bowler is allowed to movefielders before his or her delivery but no switching of players. 10.Noballs and wide balls count negative runs to the bowler. 11. Batsmandoes not record extra runs; runs should score off the bat. 12. Runoutsshould be recorded from the running wicket. 13. Each delivery must bedelivered within 60 seconds. 14. Each player must wear a number duringthe game and the numbers are assigned in a random order. Player wearingnumber one start batting and number two player start bowling. 15. At thebeginning of the game each player is assigned a field position and asthe game goes on these positions keeps rotating according to apredetermined plan which is based on players' assigned numbers. 16. Gameshould be played without any breaks. 17. Scoring should be done in thestandard Cricket Derby ™ scorecard. The bowling title goes to the playerwho gives away least points and player who scores the most points getsthe batting title. The Cricket Derby ™ Winner is the one who gets thehighest combined score from batting, bowling and fielding 18. Tiebreakers: In case of a tie in bowling or batting ranking, two way ormultiple ways, individual performance against tied players willdetermine the final ranking as described below: 3-way tie in bowlingranking compares scores against each other. Step 1 #1 #5 #6 #1 x 1 4 =5#1 will rank above #5 & #6 #5 W x 2 =0 #6 2 1 x =3 Step 2 #5 #6 #5 x 2=2 #5 will rank above #6 #6 1 x =1 A.   if there are further ties afterabove steps in the bowling ranking then the following tie breakers comein that order.             Highest wicket taker               Lowestextras given                 Highest number of catch taker These tiebreakers should finalize the ranking in bowling. B.   If there arefurther ties after above steps in the batting ranking then the followingtie breakers come in that order.         1. Least number of outs        2. Highest number of boundaries         3. Highest number ofcatch taker These tie breakers should finalize the ranking in batting.Once ranking in the batting and bowling are finalized, ties in the finalranking will be break according to the batting ranking.

While certain novel features of this invention have been shown anddescribed and are pointed out in the annexed claims, it will beunderstood that various omissions, substitutions and changes in theforms and details of the game illustrated and in its execution can bemade by those skilled in the art without departing from the sprit of theinvention.

1. A method of playing a cricket ball game comprising: A. providing aplaying field for cricket game including; a. a boundary line to mark thelimits of the playing area, b. two wickets facing each in the middle ofthe playing field, c. a pitch where wickets are set up and bowling andrunning between wickets occurs, B. positioning a plurality of players invarious field positions including bowler, batsman, wicket keeper andfielders; C. keeping all the players on the playing field throughoutplay from the start to end of the game.
 2. The method of claim 1,further comprising the step of having each of the players take a turn asa batsman such that: A. the batsman faces an equal number of ballsbowled by every other player; and B. the batsman continues to bat untilevery other competing player on the field complete bowling a set numberof balls.
 3. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step ofhaving each of the players take a turn as a bowler such that the bowlerbowls a predetermined number of balls to every other competing player onthe field.